Something Unexpected
by vr2lbast
Summary: Weiss Side B, Aya x Ken, May contain spoilers. Aya fears that Ken is sinking back into despair after his confrontation with Jonathan O'Brien and tries to distract him from his thoughts, but ends up learning something about himself instead.


**Something Unexpected** (June 2007)

"Come inside, it's getting cold."

Aya Fujimiya stood in the doorway, watching his teammate stare at something unseen across the street. A pack of wild boys hooted and hollered somewhere in the darkness, but they were not the focus of this rapt attention. If those staring eyes saw anything tonight, it was a parade of ghosts, never ending, and a familiar face at its head.

Aya knew the last mission had been difficult for him and had tried to give him some space, but life went on and an open wound couldn't heal if it was picked at. It was something they had both learned over time.

Even so, this was a special case and it had hit him hard. Ken Hidaka was a social creature and not given to moments of solitary introspection; his desire to be alone was proof of how badly it had affected him. Aya called to him one more time and when Ken did not respond, he bit back the critical comments he might have made on other days, stepped outside, and closed the door. He sat down on the step beside Ken and stared out at the night with him for several minutes before speaking again.

"Is the mission bothering you?"

Ken allowed the silence to stretch out for as long as he could before nodding slightly. "I guess," he said, although he didn't turn away from his vigil.

"You did a good job," Aya told him. "A bit dramatic maybe, and a bit risky, facing O'Brien alone, but you did well. I wasn't sure you would, you never were the planning type."

"Hey," Ken said, watching the darkness. "Gotta grow up sometime, right?"

"I didn't mean it that way," Aya said, although, he supposed, he did. "Maybe I shouldn't have dumped something this personal on you. I just thought, if you knew the people involved…"

"No. No, it's fine," Ken said, his tone lightening as he began to surface from the deep well of his private thoughts. "I didn't want to," he admitted, "but, you know, I think maybe it was better like this. I mean, I know now. I didn't want to have to choose – I mean, I'm a fucking murderer on demand for Christ's sake, if I start picking victims myself it's never going to stop, right? But if someone else had told me to do it, I'd have always wondered how things really went down. This way, I know, right?"

Ken's voice had a desperate edge to it as if he was trying hard to convince himself rather than Aya. Self-doubt was dangerous territory and Aya tried to lead him away from it slowly.

"If not the murderer, then who?" he said. "If a murderer can compound his sins, it's by killing indiscriminately instead of with forethought. How are you feeling?"

"Not as bad as I thought I would," Ken said. "Not all wound up and ready to go again. A year ago, I could have painted the whole town red. Now I'm just tired."

"You're getting old," Aya told him and Ken laughed. Aya was surprised to feel himself relax at the sound. He hadn't even known how tense he was. "Now come in before you catch a chill."

"Yeah, we old geezers can't take the cold," Ken said, and then he sighed. "I just don't feel like being around all the guys right now."

"Give us some credit," Aya told him. "We aren't fools. Michel and Yuki are holed up in Yuki's room playing video games, Free's off reading somewhere, and Chloe's gone out for the evening."

Ken grinned. "Chloe would do that anyway. It's not for my benefit."

"It is if he leaves a six-pack in the refrigerator for you before he goes," Aya said.

"Oh yeah?"

"And I'm going to drink it on your behalf if you don't get inside right now."

"Bitch, bitch, bitch," Ken said as he stood up, but he was smiling. "So, if you're all giving me space and shit, why are you still here?"

"Because I've known you the longest," Aya said, "and even when you want to be alone, you like to know there's someone nearby."

"Tch."

Ken clicked his tongue in mock disgust, but allowed Aya to usher him into the house. He stopped in the kitchen to check the refrigerator and found, as promised, six bottles of beer.

"Well, I'll be damned," he said, grabbing one and twisting off the cap.

Aya pulled it easily out of his hand. "First get your coat off. And your shirt."

"What? In the kitchen? I always knew you were a kinky bastard," Ken said, but pulled off his jacket anyway.

Aya snorted and took it, motioning for Ken to make it quick with the shirt. "Don't flatter yourself," he said as his teammate reluctantly obeyed. "You might have washed the blood off, but I know you haven't cleaned yourself up. You took a real beating today."

"Not so bad," Ken said, smiling bitterly. "Jonathan never could kick for shit."

"Nothing wrong with his hook," Aya said drily, thumbing Ken's split lip.

Ken waved him away and tossed his balled up shirt aside, spreading his arms wide as if inviting Aya to take a good, long look. Aya did and was not impressed.

"Are you sure you don't have cracked ribs? You're covered in bruises," he said, handing over the bottle of beer.

Ken took a long pull and shrugged. "What are you, my mother?"

"Someone should be, you need looking after," Aya told him. "Even if it doesn't hurt now, it's going to be a bitch in the morning. I'm going to wrap it for the night. You can take the bandage off tomorrow if you're up to it."

"Fussy, fussy."

Ken finished his beer while Aya fetched the first aid kit. Putting the empty bottle aside, he submitted himself to a tension bandage and the cleaning of his cuts with a cool, damp cloth. He even accepted a second beer from Aya when it was handed over.

"Hey now," Ken said as he uncapped the bottle. "You keep fussing over me and you're going to give me the wrong idea."

"You mean the idea that I want you rested and in one piece by morning so you can pull your shift?" Aya replied as he collected the empty and put it away.

"Yeah, well, that too."

Ken took a long drink and then stared at the bottle in his hand. "I probably shouldn't even be having this," he told Aya, dropping his voice, infused with a ghost of despair. "Some days I have visions of sliding the other way and ending up like Yohji, drowning myself in drugs and alcohol, trying to forget."

"Don't forget the women," Aya said, half-joking. Yohji had turned out all right in the end, happily married and still in Japan.

"None for me, thanks," Ken snorted. "That never works out in this line of work. Either you can't tell them anything or they turn out to have bigger issues than you do. Besides, you already know how I feel about that."

Aya nodded. After Yuriko, Ken had stopped taking an interest in girls. Eventually, he had taken an interest in Aya. The feelings had not been entirely unwelcome, but, there had been his sister to worry about and, once she was well, the years of emotional alienation to work out, which always led to fights and hard feelings. And then, Ken had…changed.

Aya hadn't been able to handle it and he had vanished for as long as he was able. Until Koua, when Ken professed the same feelings, but with a strange, manic edge, and then until England, when Ken had done the same, but with a quiet calm that Aya had never seen before.

"Well," Aya said, carefully side stepping old emotions, "it isn't as if you drink regularly. Two, even three, bottles of beer on a bad night won't make you a drunk. I've been with you long enough to know that the worst it will do is put you to sleep."

"At least my sleep is long and hard," Ken said and grinned when Aya cuffed him lightly on the back of the head. He nodded toward the first aid kit, its contents spilled out across the table. "You want help with that?"

"No, it's fine," Aya said. "I want you to relax tonight. Why don't you go stretch out in the front room? There might be a movie on."

"I'm gonna feel like a right princess, you keep that up," Ken said. He was smiling, but a note of concern crept into his voice. "You gonna join me?"

"When I'm done."

Ken looked relieved as he took his bottle and left the room. "I'll save you a spot."

Aya watched him go and then began to gather up the debris of his caregiving. He heard the faint chatter of voices as the television came on and pictured Ken slumped back on the sofa, glancing anxiously over his shoulder.

Strange to think that, only moments ago, Aya had worried that he couldn't convince Ken to come inside. Now Ken seemed to want constant companionship, as if he had needed someone to break the spell of his solitude. Could his thoughts be so dark that he feared to go back to them? And, if so, could Aya say he was ready for the responsibility of keeping them at bay?

Aya snorted as he snapped the first aid kit shut and cast the thought from his mind. He was making one night of comfort sound like a lifetime of commitment.

Putting the kit away, Aya fished two more bottles out of the refrigerator and went to join Ken on the sofa. The room was dark, lit only by the shifting glow of the television screen and, as predicted, Ken was slumped back in his seat. He should have looked vulnerable, bandaged as he was, old scars gleaming with a whiter, more silvery light than the rest of his skin, but all Aya could think was that he looked strong and healthy. It had been a long time since he had seen Ken so clear-headed and self-possessed. The mission bothered him, that much was plain, but he was muddling through the pain at his own pace rather than internalizing it and letting it sour.

When he realized that Aya was watching him, Ken straightened up and tried to look presentable. He glanced upward, eyebrows raised, and gestured toward the bottles. Aya noticed that Ken's movements were almost languid. The alcohol was taking effect.

"Last one for the night," Aya told him, holding out one of the bottles. "If you want it, that is."

Ken put the empty in his hand on the table with a glassy clink and accepted the offering with a smile. "Thanks. What's the other one for?"

"Me," Aya told him.

"You'd drink Chloe's rare gift to me?"

"Well, you're such a giving and generous person, I knew you wouldn't mind."

Ken made a face that told Aya he knew damned well that Aya was being a smart ass, but didn't argue any further. Instead, he nodded his head toward the empty spot beside him. "Settle in, we have a lot of options tonight. You want crap, junk, or trash?"

"Go for crap," Aya said, taking his place beside Ken. He sat a bit closer than he'd intended, but it seemed rude to move. "I don't think I have the energy for trash."

"Yeah, trash is out, but, you know, the junk's looking extra junky today…"

"Definitely the crap," Aya insisted.

"Okay, your call," Ken said and lazily waved the remote in the general direction of the television, pressing two buttons as he did so. The image jumped and resolved itself into a particularly low-budget serial.

It really was crap, but that was fine by Aya. Its only purpose was to serve as a mindless distraction while he watched over Ken and waited for him to wind down enough to send to bed without worrying about whether or not the mission was growing into some kind of hell in his mind. Ken certainly seemed tired – his eyelids drooped and every move he made was heavy with weariness – but Aya could tell that he was still restless. It was in the way he often shifted his weight and the way his eyes stubbornly refused to close, not even to blink slowly or have the sleep rubbed from them. And every time he moved, the light played over the scars that crept out from under his bandages and traced lines over his belly.

One particular knot on Ken's left caught Aya's attention. He remembered that scar.

Ken caught him staring and gave him an inquisitive look. "What?"

"Just wondering if you're tired," Aya said.

Ken was not convinced. "Is my belly button going to give you some secret sign?"

The comment startled a laugh out of Aya. "No, idiot," he said, lightly cuffing Ken, who was grinning, on the ear. "I just…realized that I never apologized."

Ken looked down at his belly, noticed the scar, and understood. He snorted. "Well, shit. You don't have to, you know. I'm the one who told you to do it."

"Perhaps," Aya conceded, "but… I was thinking more of destroying that god-child than of hurting you."

"So? I was thinking more of killing than dying. Period." Ken's expression softened. "Besides, I like to think that, if you really weren't thinking of me, then you wouldn't have run us through on an angle like that. I mean, he got most of it, but you only got me off to the side. Bad, but nothing that couldn't be fixed."

"Maybe you're right," Aya said. "It's hard to remember what I was thinking. There was so much going on…"

"And we'd lost Sena. And Kyou before that," Ken agreed. "I like to think it was automatic, you know? Like you didn't have to think about it. It would have to be 'cause everything was…was crazy then."

I was crazy then.

The unspoken implication hung between them, a wound in the conversation that wouldn't quite heal. Aya wanted to step around it, to find something less upsetting to talk about, something that would keep Ken calm, but Ken, it seemed, had other plans.

"It got me through a lot of nights, thinking like that," he said. "Like, no matter how bad I got, I was worth trying to save. I didn't have to be put down, not yet. And it got me through a lot of nights when I was getting better because, well… I thought there was someone who'd see the difference and understand. And it got me through tonight because I thought, if I was going to slip, then it was going to be now and I wanted to hang on so that you wouldn't have to go that last step."

Aya noticed that Ken was tense – how could he not be, discussing such a personal subject? However, in spite his nervousness, Ken spoke calmly, rationally. The alcohol slowed his words to a steady flow instead of the rapid tumble it might have been, but they didn't slur together and he seemed clear-eyed and alert, if tired.

"I'm scared, Aya," Ken said frankly. "Every day I'm scared that I'm going to start slipping again or, worse, slide the other way so that I can't even recognize the warning signs. I wonder if Jonathan's going to be the next Kase or David the next Akira. I worry…and then I worry that I'm worrying too much and wonder if that's some kind of obsession…"

"No, I think that's normal," Aya said after a moment's hesitation. "Worrying…and worrying about worrying. Just being aware of one's weaknesses and fears and taking measures do deal with them is all anyone can do."

The look of relief that crossed Ken's face was perfect and pure. He sighed deeply, exhaling slowly. "Thanks, Aya. That means a lot coming from you. Half the time, I don't think you believed me when I told you I was better."

I didn't, Aya realized. He had spent the night taking the usual counter-measures – keep Ken at home, keep him in sight, keep him calm, sedate him – without bothering to wonder if they were necessary. "I might have been unfair," Aya conceded. "It's hard to tell how someone will react until a mission like this one comes along."

"Hey, as long as you're here," Ken said. "I just don't want to run you off." He chuckled nervously and picked at the label on his beer bottle. "I mean, I'm not self-centered enough to think I'm the only reason you've gone off on your jaunts, but I couldn't have been easy to get along with. I… I wasn't kidding when I said I needed to be with you, and that's a lot of strain, being needed. I can take care of myself now, but I still want to be around you, even if I can't be with you."

Ken steeled himself when Aya reached out, probably expecting another cuff on the ear, but Aya slid his fingers through Ken's hair instead, feeling his heart swell as Ken leaned into his touch.

"Who says that you can't?"

When Ken eyed him suspiciously, Aya smiled sadly. "I really have been unfair," he said. "I never told you that I appreciated your feelings or that I felt the same. Maybe not at first, but over time. By the time I was ready…"

Aya paused, discomfited by Ken's intense gaze. He was so open and direct that Aya wondered if he could understand how it felt to care for someone and fear them at the same time.

Ken saved him the trouble of explaining. He knocked his bottle lightly against Aya's knee. "Don't worry about it," he said, his voice husky and warm. "Kids are stupid and we were just kids when they started teaching us how to kill people. It doesn't leave a lot of room for social graces. You're here now, right? You told me now, right? And you meant it?"

Aya paused. Sincere as always, Ken's expression was full of warmth and acceptance, but no forgiveness for the times he had been left behind, the years spent wandering the decaying corridors of his own mind, alone, or for tonight's belief that he would snap unless he was humoured, stroked, and plied with enough alcohol to wear him out. No forgiveness, not because Ken held a grudge, but because he didn't see anything to forgive.

"Yes," Aya said with a hint of a smile. "As you said, we all have to grow up sometime. Although I haven't allowed myself much time for social graces and this…isn't something I was expecting."

"So we go slow then," Ken said, putting his empty on the coffee table. He slumped back against the sofa and yawned deeply. "I'm not Yohji, for fuck sake. I'm not looking to get you into bed. Not tonight anyway. I just… Stay up with me?"

"I think I can manage that," Aya said, casually draping an arm around Ken's shoulders and examining his sleep-clouded eyes. "Although it might be better if you went to bed. You're worn out."

Ken looked sheepish. "It's empty in there," he said, sliding easily into the circle of Aya's arm. "And I'm still kind of wired, beer and all. I'm okay, and I'm going to keep being okay, but it was still a bad mission."

Aya supposed that Ken was right and cast around for an alternative solution. He found it in an old quilt crumpled at the far end of the sofa.

"Here," he said, putting his beer bottle aside. He pulled Ken toward him and gestured toward the blanket. "Toss that here and lie down."

Despite his puzzlement, Ken obeyed, snagging the quilt as Aya dragged him down. After a little creative wriggling, Aya managed to get Ken stretched out on top of him, his head pressed gently, but firmly to Aya's chest.

"Does this still help?" Aya said, using his free hand to smooth the blanket over them.

"Yeah," Ken said and sighed contentedly as he listened to Aya's heartbeat. Soon his breathing slowed and his words began to slur."You know if you want to go slow, we should date."

"Tomorrow," Aya said gruffly.

"Yay."

Aya sighed and flicked his ear. "I mean we'll talk about it tomorrow. For now, go to sleep."

Half asleep already, Ken grinned. "Aye aye, captain."

Aya shook his head and settled back against the arm of the sofa. It wasn't as uncomfortable as he expected, having someone lying so close to him, practically on top of him. Ken's warmth and the regularity of his breathing were soothing and Aya felt himself being lulled into a state of sleep as well. Tomorrow, he realized, would be their first day facing Kryptonbrand's missions together, not as teammates, but as a couple. It was a frightening prospect, but not as frightening as it had been in Weiss.

With age came experience. Aya hoped it could also bring happiness.

– End –


End file.
